Wednesday, January 04, 2006

More BBC "Spot the Difference" fun!

Police in the southern Indian city of Bangalore say they have arrested a man in connection with last week's gun attack at a top science institute. Police believe the suspect helped the gunman who fired at delegates, killing a professor and wounding four others. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told India's annual Science Congress in the city of Hyderabad that the man killed was "a soldier of knowledge". He said the attack was the work of "reprehensible and cowardly enemies".

'Major breakthrough'

Police say they detained the suspect, Abdul Rehman, on 1 January in his home town of Nalgonda in the neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh, about 700km (435 miles) from Bangalore. He appeared in court on Tuesday and was remanded in custody for 14 days. Police say they are not yet sure what role the 35-year-old played in the attack, but expect the arrest to lead to "a major breakthrough". "It is too early to say whether he was the mastermind or just an abettor," police commissioner Ajai Kumar Singh told the BBC. He said police had information that he was a leader of the banned Lashkar-e-Toiba militant group in southern India.

Indian police have arrested a suspected Muslim militant in connection with a shooting last week during an international conference in the city of Bangalore. Two more arrests have been made in a neighboring state. Southern Indian cities have been on high alert in the wake of the Bangalore attack. Bangalore police announced the arrest of Abdul Rahman on Tuesday. It was six days after a man opened automatic fire at a major science institute in Bangalore, India's leading technology center, killing a former professor and wounding four others. The 35-year-old Mr. Rahman was detained in the neighboring state of Andhra Pradesh on Sunday. Police say he is a key operative in southern India of the Laskhar-e-Taiba, a frontline Pakistan-based Islamic group fighting Indian rule in Kashmir. The group is also known by the initials LET.

Which is the more informative report, and which is withholding certain facts?

Later in the BBC article -

Opening the 93rd Indian Science Congress in Hyderabad, Prime Minister Singh condemned the attack in which Prof Puri died. "Dr Puri was gunned down in the greatest temple of Indian science by the most reprehensible and cowardly enemies of our people," he told delegates. He said "terrorists" were targeting India's research institutes because of the country's growing scientific and technical success.

Even when paraphrasing the PM’s speech the reporter insists on putting quotes around one particular word, lest we forget that one person’s cold-blooded murderer of a retired professor is another person’s freedom fighter.